Conventionally, component mounters called alternate mounting component mounters are known which have two mounting heads alternately mounting components onto one board in the form of coordinated operation.
For determining component mounting conditions for such alternate mounting component mounters, it has been proposed to equalize the numbers of components to be mounted by two mounting heads (see, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2004-186391).
However, a problem arises in some cases where the conventional method for determining a component mounting condition is applied to an alternate mounting component mounter having mounting heads at positions facing each other with a board in between, that is, in front and rear of the board.
More specifically, although the conventional method for determining a component mounting condition is intended to equalize the numbers of components of the two mounting heads, the numbers of tasks of the two mounting heads are not always equalized. Here, the “task” refers to a set of operations including pickup, movement, and mounting of the components, which are repeatedly performed by line gang pickup heads (mounting heads). When the total number of tasks is an odd number, the tasks need to be allocated in such a manner that the number of tasks of either one of the two mounting heads is one greater than that of the other mounting head. However, as far as the conventional method of determining a component mounting condition is concerned, no technique has addressed which one of the mounting heads should be provided with more tasks. In addition, the size of the board is different depending on the component mounting board to be produced. Thus, the distance that the mounting head on the front side moves between a component supply unit and the board is not necessarily equal to the distance that the mounting head on the rear side moves between a component supply unit and the board. Accordingly, depending on how the tasks are allocated to the mounting heads, there may occur a case where a greater number of tasks are allocated to the mounting head which moves the longer distance between the component supply unit and the board. This causes a problem that the length of time for mounting components becomes long, since the total distance that the two mounting heads move becomes great.